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Andreas Fuhrmann/Record Searchlight Rose Marie Hill, left, talks to Cathy Hartman after voting Tuesday at Redding Fire Station 5. Hartman, an election clerk, said she has been working the polls for 50 years and this is her last year. (Photo: Andreas Fuhrmann)

Voters in most presidential elections usually go to the polls to vote for the candidate they like.

In Tuesday's election, however, voters were going to the polls to vote against the candidate they don't like. At least that's what Shasta County voters were saying.

It was that dislike of both candidates that was seemingly helping to draw what may be a record voter turnout in Tuesday's election as polling sites throughout Shasta County were kept busy.

'Turnout has been marvelous,' said Kim Dargel at St. James Lutheran Church in Redding. 'It's been non-stop all day.'

There were 30 people in line when the polling site's doors opened and the line didn't stop until around 10 a.m., Dargel said.

As of noon, she said. 231 voters had cast their ballot at the precinct, while 127 more votes were cast at a separate precinct in the same church.

It was pretty much the same story at the John Beaudet Community Center in Shasta Lake.

'We have been extremely busy,' said Karen Ball, an inspector at one of the two voting precincts there.

The two precincts reported that about 75 voters had cast their ballots during the first hour after the polls opened.

'It's a good turnout, I would say,' Ball said.

Polling sites at the First United Methodist and Hillside churches in Redding, as well as the Redding Veterans Memorial Hall on Yuba Street, were also enjoying a high turnout.

Ann Przybyla, a precinct captain at the Yuba Street polling place, which included two separate precincts, said about 80 voters had cast their ballots during the first 90 minutes at her precinct.

About 100 additional voters had cast their ballots at the hall's other precinct.

Przybyla, who was enthusiastic about the turnout, said the line of voters stretched all the way to the street before the doors opened.

'It's a great day in America when you have to stand in line to vote,' she said. 'It should always be that way.'

Over at the polling place at the John Beaudet Community Center, 58-year-old Richard Tubbs of Shasta Lake hunkered down in his voting booth and was the picture of concentration as he voted.

Tubbs said afterward there were two priority issues that prompted him to vote: the presidential race and the ballot measure to approve recreational marijuana.

Tubbs, who said he can't stand Hillary Clinton, said he voted for Donald Trump, even though he acknowledged he's more against Clinton than he is for Trump.

'I'm very much against Hillary,' he said, adding he's been waiting all his life to vote for a non-politician. 'That's what I like about him.'

In contrast, 69-year-old Charlotte Coler of Redding said she voted for Clinton because she can't stand Trump.

Still, she said, she's not all that fond of Clinton, either.

'No, I'm not crazy about her, but she's better than him,' she said. 'My (ideal) choice would have been neither.'

Although voters said they are not exactly enamored with the two presidential candidates, they agree that they've never seen anything quite like the 2016 presidential election.

'Wow, amazing,' said Armfield, whose sentiments were echoed by Tim Moore, 61, also of Redding.

'Not in all my years,' he said. 'That fact alone saddens me.'

Moore, who declined to disclose which candidate he preferred, said this election was a first for him in at least one respect.

'I did not want to vote for either one' of the presidential candidates, he said.

Cathy Darling Allen, Shasta County's clerk and registrar of voters, says more than 72,000 mail-in ballots were sent out, and 22,514 had been returned as of the middle of last week, the last official count.

Since then, she said, thousands more had poured in, with elections officials emptying ballot boxes around the county three or four times a day — even on weekends.

Darling Allen said Monday that early returns show that Shasta County turnout may exceed the 84 percent recorded in 2008, the highest ever.